


Hair Triggers

by dust_motes



Category: Deus Ex (Video Games), Deus Ex: Mankind Divided
Genre: Barebacking, First Time, M/M, Pining, Porn with Feelings, Sharing Clothes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-08
Updated: 2019-11-08
Packaged: 2021-01-02 14:43:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21163343
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dust_motes/pseuds/dust_motes
Summary: One arrest, one memory, one set of clothes, and a resolution finally found.





	Hair Triggers

**Author's Note:**

  * For [linndechir](https://archiveofourown.org/users/linndechir/gifts).

> Happy Shipoween, Linndechir! Your likes and prompts were a delight to work with; I can only hope I managed to write something that did them justice.
> 
> R kept my SPAG in check; Stark talked to me about liquor stores and held my hand when I needed it—thank you both very much!

October in Prague—early darkness and rain. Street lamps' halos reflected on wet asphalt mock absolution; in a city where every mercy is a short-lived joke the concept is laughable. At least passers-by don't bother to pretend they're friendly.

Adam is mostly glad to just be outside.

The police station looms at his back. On his wrists the phantom weight of the EMP cuffs presses in places where his bones would've protruded had he still had bones. He gets an uncomfortable urge to rub his pulse-points-without-a-pulse raw. He snakes his left hand—too angular to be human, too restless to be anything but—inside his right sleeve; fiber catches on fiber, drags like skin drags only against broken glass. The snikt of a sliding door opening and closing behind him catches him mid-motion, jerking his hand to a halt. His elbow unbends all at once like an uncoiling rope.

Miller's walking up to him; Adam knows his gait, can pick it out over the buzz and chatter of TF29's office on a busy Monday morning. It is a Sunday evening now, the city sounds muffled by rain, and Miller's steps on the back-alley pavement prove to be no challenge at all. 

Except when they stop close enough his open umbrella shields both of them from the rain and that's—very close.

Adam carefully doesn't think of leaning back, but it's still a fight to not let himself orbit toward Miller. To not just turn and be face to face with him for as long as he'd get before Miller would inevitably turn away himself. To not— Shit. He needs a smoke. Better yet, he needs to get going, but somehow he doubts leaving without a word would land well with Miller after he pulled God knows how many strings to get Adam out. He clears his throat. "Thank you," he says, staring forward, head held high on an overtly stiff spine. "You didn't—" A sentence impossible to end without either showing his ass or showing something else entirely. Adam's almost tempted by the first, but they've finally found balance after the London fiasco; a rehash of those first awkward weeks after Miller's medical leave would be fucking exhausting. Adam gets tired just thinking about it. "Just—Thank you." He still can't bring himself to look Miller in the face, so he pats his coat, looking for his cigs, only to remember the cops confiscated his stuff and 'forgot' to give some of it back when Miller made them let him go. The pack was newly opened, too. Assholes. It irritates Adam more than iniquity of such a small scale has any right to. 

Sometimes, he's surprised iniquities of any scale still manage to make him feel anything at all.

Miller shifts. The movement puts him in the periphery of Adam's vision, perpendicular to his side. The shadow of the umbrella hides the upper part of his head, but his lips are visible, pursed and slightly chapped, the scar below so pale Adam can tell where it ends only because he knows the length of it as well as the length of his nanoblades. The lines around the corners of Miller's mouth seem deeper with every passing week and the skin under his chin has become so paper-like Adam keeps thinking it's too thin to keep Miller's blood all inside. He swallows and closes his eyes behind his shades.

A mistake. The rustling of Miller's coat serves as a warning, but even so, Adam's body reacts to his touch like to a shock. Time rolls back and they're in that kitchen again, clutching onto each other's arms, suspended between a bad choice and worse, held together by a fool's hope. Adam remembers the disconnect between his combat-ready body, hyper-aware of its purpose and laser-focused on its job, and the fear that should've made his hands tremble and his pulse quicken but it didn't because it didn't have a way to reach his limbs. He remembers—No. No point in remembering. Adam opens his eyes, looks down at Miller's hand on his elbow. It squeezes Adam once, but firmly enough that his coat squelches under the pressure of Miller's fingers, rainwater seeping out of the sleeve, fabric clinging to the Henley underneath. Miller winces, dropping his hand. "Jesus. Let's get you home."

⬖⬘⬗⬙

Hazy behind the sheet of rain, the entrance to the metro shines like a maw of a radioactive monster; the silhouettes in front of it are cast in sharp relief against the bluish neon light, tactical gear and augmented legs starring in the shadow play visible on the wall behind them. Adam and Miller slip past the cop and the unfortunate woman in a pink beanie (the color is so aggressively optimistic Adam immediately feels the urge to burn it to ash) uninterrupted, but Adam stops at the very beginning of the platform, keeps his eyes on the scene.

Miller shakes his umbrella. Despite stretching out his arm, he showers them both in raindrops. Adam spares him a glance. His wrist is poking out from the sleeve of his coat, a thin strip of pale skin visible between the gray fabric and the black leather of his glove. Adam shifts his eyes to the cop pestering Pink Beanie for more identification. "Look, boss—"

"Come to mine?" Miller asks at the same time. 

Adam hasn't been back since the break-in; even when the team went to visit after Miller got released from the hospital, he stayed behind. He had good reasons for that, he knows he did. They're still valid. So he won't. And yet he—he _wants_.

The cop shoves Pink Beanie, hard enough her back connects with the wall with a dull thud. _Shit_, Adam thinks. _Shit._ He twitches to move, forces himself to stand still. Miller's with him and Adam has already ruined the weekend enough for both of them and besides, there isn't much he can do. He doesn't look the other way, not like the people entering the station passing the violence by, but—Isn't it worse? 

Pink Beanie does her best to melt with the wall. The cop pokes her with the muzzle, gesturing with her papers. He hasn't tried to cuff her yet so they must be good enough he can't just detain her, but in this city it doesn't mean much. She puts a hand to her mouth. The shadow version of her arm is so long, so delicate, it resembles a spider's leg.

The servos in his knee and elbow joints wake up with a buzz as Adam changes his stance, puts more weight on the forward leg. He very pointedly doesn't look at Miller.

A tourist appears behind the cop, a soaked map held in her hand. She shoves it in his face, accented English rising above the patter of rain, the steps on the platform, and the gun clanking against the tac-vest when the cop loses his grip on both the gun and Pink Beanie's papers.

Prague's tourism profits are responsible for a chunk of the city's budget big enough that the cops are instructed to play nice with the foreigners. When the tourist cries, "Oh God I'm so very sorry I didn't want to hit you but I got so utterly lost help me could you help me please help me" without stopping to gulp down air once, he reluctantly takes the map.

Pink Beanie is smart and quick enough to grab her papers immediately and clutch them to her chest, but beside that action, she's frozen to her spot. Adam can hear the train in the tunnel, approaching fast, and thinks, _Shit, shit, shit_ again, and takes a step forward. 

Running would attract too much attention; he walks quickly and with purpose. By the time he's halfway up the ramp, he knows they'll be too late, but he grabs Pink Beanie by her elbow when he reaches her anyway. Over the cop's shoulder, he catches the tourist's eye; she doubles down on her whining carried out in an increasingly shrill voice. It hurts his ears. Despite himself, Adam smiles walking down the ramp with Pink Beanie's hand clasped tightly in his.

Down at the platform, Miller's keeping the train's door open for them. Adam shoves Pink Beanie inside, jumps in after her, and the door closes with a hiss. She starts saying something in rapid Czech, something about her papers and the naturals train, but shuts up when she sees Miller's pissed-off pose and the Interpol badge now hanging from his neck. Luckily, other passengers seem to adopt the same approach. "Thank you," Adam mouths at him over her head. Miller's lips twitch.

They move from the door to the most people-free area by the end of the carriage. Pink Beanie tries to show Miller her papers, but he stops her with an open palm. "I'm sure they're fine," he says. "Okay?" he adds when she inquiringly tilts her head.

"Are you alright?" Adam asks. God, he has to stop dragging his feet with the language already. Especially now that he knows he won't leave unless he has absolutely no choice whatsoever.

Pink Beanie's teeth dig into her lower lip. "Okay," she repeats after Miller. "Okay."

It's brief, but Miller smiles at her in response.

⬘⬗⬙⬖

They get lucky at the Palisade station. Nobody stops them when they get off the train, nobody wants to see their papers. Miller buttons up his coat, hiding his badge. Pink Beanie takes of the hat and combs her almost-white hair with her fingers. "Překážka?" Adam asks her.

She shakes her head and touches her chest over her heart. "I am okay." Adam must look unconvinced because she adds, "Don't worry." Then she touches the sleeve of Miller's coat, turns on her heel and walks away. 

"Take care," Adam says to her retreating back. Miller's jaw must be working on a scolding by now. He turns to him, opening his arms, faking innocence as he sometimes used to with Pritchard. "God, that fucking hat hurt my eyes." He cocks his eyebrows exaggeratedly enough they show up over the upper lines of his shades; sometimes Miller's so easy to goad into banter it's ridiculous. Other times—

Other times Miller looks at Adam like he's looking at him now, with _something_ written into the lines of his expression, not quite soft but as if one layer of his safeguards has gotten stripped down. "Pink's not really your color," he says. One corner of his mouth turns up.

Adam's throat closes around his heartbeat; he can't seem to swallow it down. "Doesn't go with the gold." He flexes his fingers by his sides, curling them around air. Miller's gaze shoots down like maybe he wants to disagree. Adam's hands still and it locks on them.

The Palisade is always crowded; people bustle around. Someone bumps into Adam's back. "Zasraný aug," he hears. Background noise, barely enough to make him move but move he does. He takes a step, two steps, three—towards Miller. Fuck.

Miller very slowly lifts his eyes back to Adam's face. "So." He clears his throat. "You coming?"

_No_ sounds like a very clean break. Adam's big on those. "Why? You wanna debrief?" he quips instead.

Millers snorts. "I wasn't aware you had any active investigations. Are you saying Mac's been going behind my back to assign you to infiltrate, what, a ring of police cigarette thieves?"

Of course he noticed. Adam groans. "You're far too observant," he mutters.

"I just know how much you smoke."

It's the problem with Miller, Adam decided ages ago. He _knows_ Adam. He comes every time Adam calls; the one constant in his life. It fucks with Adam's head.

He needs to put a stop to it. He needs to give Miller an answer. A straightforward one. He doesn't think he'll be able to do it, then he realizes he already has. He's crossed the distance separating them; they're standing chest to chest now, within reach of each other's arms. It's not a yes, but it's a lot closer to it than to a no. "Boss—" he begins.

"You're shivering," Miller cuts in.

Adam is. He's wet and cold, as much as he gets cold these days. "I can't catch pneumonia," he points out.

"Of course not. It's just—" Miller drags a hand down his face, fingers catching on lips, showing his teeth. Even in the station's shitty light they gleam white and sharp. Miller's a dangerous man. Adam sometimes foolishly forgets. "I live seven minutes away from here. I have a shower and enough food for a small army."

We have showers in Překážka, Adam should say. Hot water, too. Enjoy the rest of your weekend after spending four hours at the station arguing for an agent who fucked up.

Any of those sentences would do. They aren't untrue, except in the fact that what he really wants to say to Miller mostly amounts to, God, just take me to bed. "Fine," he compromises. "Does this offer come with a drink?" 

Maybe not much of a compromise, after all. But it makes Miller smile. "Depends. You're more of a whiskey man than a wine man, right?" Adam nods. "We might need to make a stop."

⬗⬙⬖⬘

In front of a 24/7 liquor store on a dingy alley, a big sign with a crossed out figure with mechanical limbs glaring at Adam from the window, NO AUGS written in bold red letters under it in case the visual wasn't clear enough, Miller presses the umbrella into his hand. "Sorry," he mutters, "it's the only one open on Sundays. We can skip that drink?"

Adam shrugs. In Čistá Čtvrť even back-alley establishments have similar decorations on their doors and he really needs some alcohol in him right about four hours ago."No, it's fine. Go ahead." 

"Right." Their hands brush when he takes the umbrella. Miller's fingers slide off the base of Adam's thumb like a branding iron. "Wait for me?" Maybe he thinks Adam's gonna bolt as soon as he disappears inside. The umbrella is a sound strategy, then; Adam wouldn't let him walk back to his building without one in this weather.

Rain pit-a-pats on the waterproof fabric with the abandon of a pianist losing themselves to the music far from any prying eyes. Adam's eyes follow Miller's inside the store through the reinforced glass. The clerk greets him with a smile. The too-dazzling light plays up the tailored cut of his coat and the thick, expensive weave of it. Miller looks much too posh for this place, much too foreign; he'd fit better in the bar of a five-star hotel on the Hlavní. The clerk must be trying to come up with a convincing scam to swindle the rich tourist right about now.

If only he knew.

Miller devised three viable plans to take him out in ten seconds flat as soon as he stepped over the threshold, just as Adam would have. Men like him—men like _them_—don't really fit in anywhere, neither in a liquor store nor at a fancy bar, except on a battlefield.

Is that what destroyed Miller's marriage? 

Adam looks down, viciously embarrassed, but the question has already taken root and keeps popping up in his head even as he tries his darndest to shut it down. It's nothing, he tells himself. Just antsiness from the lack of nicotine making his thoughts stray. 

A bottle of Nye's Rye in a paper bag appears in front of his eyes. He didn't hear Miller come out. He looks up and Miller tosses him a pack of Royal Hellhounds. The reflex boost whirrs to life and Adam catches it with one hand. "Thanks."

Miller shrugs. "Just get on with it. I'm not letting you smoke inside."

Adam stretches his mouth wide. "I wouldn't dream of it." He turns the pack in his hand, forces himself to focus on the edges of it. His lighter, he thinks, fell victim to the cops' grabby hands like the rest of it. He wonders if he could use the TESLA to light up. In Překážka, he would probably risk it. Here, he hesitates. He looks at Miller and Miller already has a lighter in his outstretched hand. "I've got nothing on file about you conjuring a flame from your fingertip," he says.

"A terrible oversight on Sarif's part." Adam rips the cellophane off the pack, levers the lid up with his thumb and taps the opening against the wrist of the hand holding the umbrella. The butt of one cigarette slips out and Adam pulls at it with his teeth, aware of Miller's closeness and his eyes fixed on Adam's lips.

Aware that, beside Miller, he's not aware of much at all, the street, the people around, the brightness flooding them from the store's windows fading into the background alongside the rain and the cold. Adam's want is a living, breathing thing under the nanocarbon and skin, where nothing at all needs to breathe. He pockets the pack and takes the whiskey from Miller. Miller cups his hand, shielding the lighter from the wind until it produces a small flame giving his face a warm, deep glow. It's a good look on him.

(Better than the grey hued with yellow, stained with blood in London the last time they were so close. 

Adam remembers the way Miller's hand shook where it rested against Adam's elbow, the too-weak grip, the curling of his fingers, the strain in his mouth, as if Miller was trying to force it closed to save Adam from having to make this choice despite the fact that Adam already had and would again, over and over, until it stuck.

He stroked the throat under his thumb until Miller finally got the message and gave up, swallowing a good half of Adam's fears alongside the antidote. In turn, Adam swallowed the air filled with the smell of artificial mint and closed the gap between their lips. Miller, Jim then, tasted of cheap chewing gums and toothpaste from hotel bathrooms all around the world; under it, the bitterness of chemical compounds making up the counteragent sang of him being alive.

Simply alive or alive enough to kiss Adam back; it didn't matter as their tongues stroked against each other once, briefly enough it could well be a dream if not for how indubitably Adam remembers the sharp joy of it settling at the base of his spine, untouchable to the end of the world waiting for them at the time, undulled even now, after almost a year.

It wasn't supposed to be a one-off. Running through the corridors towards the meeting rooms, Adam promised himself it wouldn't be. But Miller was kept in a London hospital for three months, in a medically-induced coma for the better part of those long weeks; when he got out, returning to that kitchen had to be the last thing on his mind. Adam was sure of it.)

The next gust of wind is stronger; they huddle together over the flickering flame. Adam tilts his head barely enough to touch the end of his cigarette to it, careful of the three inches to the left that would put his nose to Miller's jaw.

Three inches. Far away.

⬙⬖⬘⬗

The contrast between the warmth inside the apartment and the clinicality of the white walls and cubical furniture takes him by surprise again. He's almost forgotten the weird balance of impersonal and intimate that he found here a year ago; he's not glad it hasn't changed.

Miller drops his wallet and badge on the counter by the door and turns to Adam. The small frown, the one that always shows up between Miller's brows immediately after he sees Adam with the shades retraced, appears and smooths out in a span of a second. Adam's always very charmed by it. He makes the effort to not stare as Miller waves his hand in the general direction of the kitchen and the bathroom on its other end. "Go and have a shower. Put your things in the washer; they're soaked. I'll grab you something to wear." He climbs the stairs. Adam—doesn't watch him go.

He looks around, trying and failing to not catalogue the changes. The photos above the counter are old. The bike _looks_ like it did, but Adam doesn't know enough about cycling to be sure. The nook under the stairs holds more books and fewer bottles of wine. The size of the flag still makes him laugh. The espresso machine is different; now it has even more taps and spigots and… thingies you put ground coffee into. On the other side of the kitchen-lounge, the sofa's the same garish green. 

"Jensen!" Miller snaps, coming down. "Your coat is making a puddle out of my hall."

Adam winces, looking down. It's a lot of water. "Sorry, boss." 

A bundle of soft clothes is thrust into his arms. "Shower. Now."

Undressing in Miller's bathroom feels slightly unreal. He shouldn't be allowed to. He shouldn't be looking into the same mirror Miller looks into every morning, touching the same faucets and porcelain and glass, standing on the same tile Miller's naked feet stand on when water pours down onto his naked body. (He definitely shouldn't be thinking about Miller naked that much; contemplating what else Miller might be getting up to in here when he's stressed out or wired or plain horny should be off-limits as well. Adam's crossing boundaries today like it's eating candy.) Still, he stays under the scalding spray for a long time—city-wide central heating means you don't have to worry about the rapid switch from hot water to cold; it may be the sole good quality of Prague—washing the police station stink off his body and pretending it's not the only time he—Adam turns off the shower with a gesture as rapid as it is tightly-controlled. Enough is enough.

It gets more difficult from then on.

The clothes Miller has left for him are soft and worn: dark green wool joggers and a grey T-shirt, snug in the arms, fitted in the chest, and a bit loose in the waist. Adam doesn't think of what it tells him about Miller's physique. He doesn't.

He's put one leg inside the pants when he realizes his underwear is in the washer with the rest of his clothes. Not much he can do about it now unless he wants to sit on the toilet waiting for the washing and drying cycles to end, but— Fuck, fuck, fuck. _Fuck_. He keeps cursing under his breath until his tongue gets numb. Tugging on Miller's pants over his unclothed hips seems like more of a breach of trust than any unbidden image that stood in front of Adam's eyes in the shower. It's the touching, Adam thinks. His cock touches the inner side of the fabric as it slides up over it, the thick seams rub at it in the exact places they rub at Miller's cock when he has these pants on. The quiet intimacy of it makes his throat tight. It's too much like what he really wants.

To make matters even worse, Miller's prepping dinner on the other side of the wall. Adam heard chopping and now the smell of frying butter wafts into the bathroom through the slit under the door. As tempting as it is, he can't hide here forever.

He splashes cold water over his face, avoids his eyes in the mirror, and walks out.

Three fingers of whiskey in a thick glass are waiting for him on the kitchen island's countertop. In the state he's in, it would almost be enough to get him drunk. He opts to lean against the door frame instead.

Miller hasn't turned his head to him. He's stirring something on the stove, jacket discarded but the waistcoat still on, still meticulously buttoned up. The rolled up shirt sleeves show Miller's forearms, tendons and veins standing out stark against the weathered skin. The line of his jaw is very pleasant to look at.

They can get away with a little bit of comfortable silence. It's not damning like crossing the kitchen would be, like putting his hands to those hips would be, like kissing would be. Adam lets himself, well, stare; in his defence, when Miller finally turns and takes one look at his clothes on Adam's body, he stares as well.

The silence doesn't stay comfortable for long.

"I didn't know you cooked," Adam says, looking away first.

Miller snorts. "I have two kids. Did you think I was raising them on sweetened cereals and fast food?"

It's a jab, but more importantly, it's dangerous family talk. Adam racks his brain over what the Jensen who never broke into his boss's apartment and examined said boss's personal stuff would know about his off-the-clock life. Miller doesn't mention his family often at work, if at all, but—They shared drinks before. They talked. It wasn't casual. "Uhm," he starts.

Miller switches off the stovetop, moves the pan to a coaster on his left with his back turned to Adam. Adam wants to pretend it's trust.

"Don't," Miller says, not turning back. He's clutching at the countertop with his right hand, thumb under the ridge and pressing up hard. Adam sees the tension in it. He, too, is so tensed up the bolts in his chest might pop. "Don't—strain your brain. I know it was you."

Adam breathes in and out. His augs are in overdrive, sending short electrical impulses between parts of his body that shouldn't be connected at all in response to this shitshow, but maybe it's better this way. He doesn't want to lie to Miller anymore, even by omission, even for his own good. At least about this, if not about everything. It's a first and it's scary and it's the only way to finally put London behind them. Adam wants that clearing of space ahead.

"Jim," he says, pushing himself off of the doorframe, "I—"

"And don't fucking apologize." It has half of Miller's indignation post-G.A.R.M. and twice the sting. "I don't wanna talk about it."

Adam stops in the middle of the kitchen. The whiskey Miller has poured him is within his reach; he runs his index fingers over the rim of the glass. "We can," he says softly. "I'll be as honest as I can."

Miller rolls his shoulders with a gentle wave. "Which is not very much." Not an accusation. Matter-of-fact.

"I hoped it could be enough."

It startles a surprised laugh out of Miller. "I guessed some of it. I had some other things confirmed."

Adam smiles despite himself. It's director Miller at his best. "Ouch. You saying I'm a shit conspirator?"

Well, at least it gets Miller to turn to glower at him. "There _are_ lots of gaps." 

Silence, again. Adam thinks they're both afraid.

"Well, I could—" he starts.

At the same time, Miller says, "Fuck. The food's gonna be useless." He moves to turn the knob of a burner, but he does it angrily enough his fingers slip off of it. He tries again; Adam crosses the kitchen—it takes him maybe a heartbeat—and puts his hand on Miller's hand, trapping it, stilling it, holding it.

"You know the most important thing," he whispers with his mouth just behind Miller's ear. His other hand loses the last round against common sense and curls around Miller's hip. 

Miller's radiating heat and pissed-off worry and sex appeal. "Do I, though?"

"You know shit's big. And you know—" Adam swallows. It tastes of bile and fear and clings to the back of his throat and if Adam can't get the words out, it will stay there. "You know just how much of it I'm willing to risk for you."

Miller—_Jim_—groans. "A year, Adam. I thought you'd decided it had been a mistake. I thought you had reasons for—"

Adam noses at the back of Jim's neck, cropped hair on the side of his head, his ear and the soft skin behind it, his jaw. He forgets to answer until Jim's twisting in his arms and they're face to face and time stumbles on Jim's angry-fond glare. "I did. It seems they weren't very good reasons after all."

"_Adam_. Fucking hell." 

Adam cups Jim's face in his hand. "I know. I'm sorry. I _know_."

It's a different first kiss. 

To begin with: Jim holds Adam where he wants him, strong hand on the side of his neck, on the back, sliding down and up, shoulders, waist, hips, ass, pulling him in, in, _in_.

To begin with: they laugh when they come up for air, and laughter doesn't taste like mint or fake. It doesn't taste like anything, it's not a barrier, it doesn't stand between them.

To begin with: they don't have to—don't want to—stop. 

They kiss for a long time, not frantic but not unhurried either, simply in their own rhythm, tongues brushing inside open mouths, lips sealed and unsealed and sealed again on silent secrets they pass back and forth. Adam gets his teeth on the scar on Jim's chin like he's wanted to since he noticed it the first time he and Jim were outside together in broad daylight and a sunray fell on Jim's face just right. Every half-minute or so Jim's index finger and thumb come back to the hem of Adam's T-shirt to rub the fabric; his eyes are astonished and wild.

If Jim can't believe that Adam, in his clothes, here—if he can't believe that _they_ are here—Adam doesn't have a more effective means of convincing him than a deep, grounding kiss.

They move blindly across the kitchen, Adam's back to the fridge when Jim pushes them off the island, Jim's hip to a cabinet, with enough force to bruise, fuck, it had to hurt; Adam curls a protective hand over the bit of skin that must have reddened from the impact. His elbow knocks a piece of glassware on the countertop, a crash, they don't stop to see what tumbled down.

A wall appears behind Jim's back; Adam crowds him into it. They are hard and getting harder, but even that is slow as honey and tar, an inevitability more than a need. Still, Adam doesn't resist when Jim draws him in. He groans into Jim's mouth when their groins collide and the seam of the joggers drags over the vein on the underside of Adam's cock. Jim's fingers are digging into Adam's skin just above the waistband of Adam's pants—just above the flesh-aug divide of Adam's hips. His other hand has slipped inside and is cupping Adam's ass. If Jim finds it strange that the nanocarbon doesn't give in when he presses his fingertips into the crease atop Adam's thigh, Adam can't tell. Jim's still eager, still with restless hands. Adam could get on his knees for him right here, by the bathroom door, on the hard tiled floor his augmented joints wouldn't be discomfited by.

In fact, he almost does. Jim's hands shoot up and cup Adam's elbows from below to stop him with a gentle touch. He's biting his lower lip; Adam's nearing in to pull it between his own teeth. "Adam," Jim says before their mouths meet. "Adam, wait, fuck." His body melts into the wall, open and lax. "Bed?"

The bed's upstairs, far. There are photos on the way there Adam doesn't want to see, as petty and unfair as it is, Jim's arms around another man when Adam's hardly felt them around himself yet. "Couch?" he countersuggests.

Jim pushes him away to look at him with amazed incredulity. "By the fucking window? Do you want everyone to see?"

Adam—wouldn't exactly mind. But he stretches his arm back, eyes still fixed on Jim's eyes. A twist of his wrist and—Well, his control's a bit frayed. The roller falls too quickly and with a thud. 

The line of Jim's shoulders slouches down. "I can't believe you." He slips past Adam and into the bathroom. Adam would be worried he went too far, except for how amusement crinkles Jim's face in slightly unexpected ways, unseen before. It's not that it makes it easier to follow Jim—Adam has never found that a difficult task—but it is new and exciting. He leans against the doorframe again; the other shoulder is touching it now, he's turned the other way, but still—but always—toward Jim. Their eyes meet in the mirror. Adam smiles. Jim opens the cabinet to take out a bottle and a packet and pockets them in his tailored pants. 

Someone you're about to screw for the first time handling lube and condoms should be awkward as hell. Jim's so sure in his body and what he does Adam's brain bludgeons past 'awkward' and into the 'holy shit yes' territory with a VTOL's speed. He wants to cross the distance between them right now, but they would end up fucking on the floor if he did, so he stays put, waiting for Jim to come back to him. An inevitability still, laced with a wilder need.

When Jim turns, Adam knots his fingers into the back of his T-shirt and pulls it over his head. If he had Jim's attention before, it's different now. Like there's no coming back. It does make him want to hide; he hooks his thumbs into his waistband before it becomes unbearable. He knows what hiding from Jim feels like, now he'd rather feel—Jim.

Naked, he turns away. Jim's eyes burn holes in his back as he walks through the apartment, Jim's footsteps close behind.

He makes it to the fridge before Jim grabs him. To grope and kiss and Adam's rethinking his couch suggestion—the countertop is right here—but Jim stops him before he can slip his hand inside his pants. "Don't even think about it."

"Mhm. Might be too late for that."

It earns him a stinging slap on the ass. Adam files it away for later.

In the end it's Jim's focus that gets them to the couch and it's Adam who pushes Jim down onto it before Jim can undress and it's Adam who sinks onto the floor between Jim's spread thighs. "Adam, fuck," Jim hisses like even just the sight of Adam's bowed back is too much. 

Adam shoots him a grin, fingers already working on Jim's belt, his fly, finally slipping inside and pulling Jim's cock out, slightly curved and thick, and Adam's hit with an idiotic thought that it is beautiful. He pulls it into his mouth to drown the thought out, Jim's desperate, "Adam, wait, what about—? _Adam!_" halting on a punched-out breath.

Adam's careful with his teeth but unwavering. His mouth accommodates Jim with a surprising ease as Jim's cock slides further and further in across Adam's tongue, the weight and shape of it head-spinningly familiar just after ten seconds or so. Adam pulls back, curling his tongue around Jim's girth until only the tip stays behind his lips. He fumbles for Jim's hand; it's clutching an unopened condom like it's an anchor. Adam gently pries it away from him and tosses it further on the couch. He puts Jim's hand on his head. They eyes meet. Jim looks—

Jim looks like Adam's the best thing that's happened to him in God knows how long.

That's not very fair. Jim's a good man who should have only good things happen to him; Adam would change the past for him if he could. He can't, but he can give him this: eyes on Jim's eyes as he bobs his head, the heat of his mouth, his tongue following the length of the vein running from the base of Jim's cock to the tip, licking across the slit, the smooth surface of his thumb tenderly tracing the curve of Jim's balls and pressing just behind. Jim groans; his eyes fall shut. He curls his fingers in Adam's hair. Adam hollows his cheek, sucks gently, sucks harder. Soon, Jim's fucking Adam's face with fast, sharp thrusts, breaching the opening of his throat again and again, making a home there for his cockhead, for as much of him as Adam's willing to take.

Which is—only everything. He wants everything, or at least as close to it as you can get without crawling under the other person's skin.

Adam pulls away when he starts humping the couch. With his augs, he should never be unsteady on his feet, but he is, he so is, as he gets up and climbs into Jim's lap, letting Jim's cock drag on the inside of his thigh. He hesitates kneeling above Jim, hand caressing the back of his neck, but Jim only tilts his head and surges up to lick into his mouth, filthy and sweet and everything in between.

They're so far gone Adam wouldn't know how to ask for what he wants with words and even like this, with a kiss and a nip and teeth on skin and need, it's mostly lost to him as soon as he wrangles himself away from Jim.

Luckily for him, Jim doesn't need to be asked.

He groans into the dip of Adam's throat. His hands are shaking as they skim down Adam's sides and behind his back, to the cleft of his ass, but they move with purpose, too, and Adam will never know how Jim can be so many things at once, deliberate and open, guarded and rapt, and above all else, his.

Too soon and one year—hell, if he's honest with himself, almost two years—delayed, but somehow, wondrously, not too late.

Adam feels the bottle of lube pressing into his shin where he kneels across Jim's thighs. He scrabbles for it, afraid it'll burst in his grip as soon as he gets his fingers around it, too impatient to care. His fingers are a blur of black and gold as he squeezes it above Jim's hand, and yeah, the bottle does break. Jim laughs into his neck and kisses his collarbone and noses at a bolt on his chest as he presses inside with two fingers at once, thumb circling the rim of Adam's hole, and yes.

Adam arches his back and grinds down and grinds up, their cocks trapped between his naked body and Jim's clothed one; he doesn't make it easier on either of them. "Please," he says into Jim's mouth, but he doubts the sound makes it past his throat. 

Jim fingers him like he fucked his face, hard and fast, four fingers slipping in and out and in and out; it's enough-not-enough, Adam needs more.

He balances on one knee, pushes the other into the couch's backrest by Jim's side, holding himself open. He doesn't wait for Jim, grabs him by the cock himself, fingers sure only because his body thinks he's in a fight. It's still incredible luck that he aligns them on the first try, Jim's cockhead exactly under Adam's hole, brushing his rim with Jim's every bitten-off exhale.

"Fuck," he hisses into Adam's skin. "Adam, fuck."

It's difficult to explain, that not many places in his body are truly his and this is one of them and he wants Jim there.

He waits, trembling, propped up on one arm above Jim's head, on a precipice with no chasm beyond. Jim's mouth finds Adam's nipple and he bites down and as Adam's spine snaps up, Jim pulls him down by his hips. 

It's not slick or smooth, it's honestly too much, but Adam's mouth opens on an awed 'oh' anyway. His knee slips from the backrests and he sits heavily on Jim's lap, Jim's thick, perfect cock stretching him wide, Jim's lips pressing his name back into his skin, all his nerve-endings, all his servos alight.

They fuck like that, Adam's body bowing and unbowing above Jim, his thighs trembling as he rises on his knees until only the head of Jim's cock remains inside him and he stills and falls down onto Jim again. It slightly burns and it drags and it feels so good Adam's speechless with it. He hauls Jim up; they lock eyes. They kiss and when the air in their lungs runs out, they pant and steal what's left of each other's breaths.

Through it all, Jim keeps meeting Adam half-way, hips snapping up, up, up, faster and faster, to match Adam's quickening rhythm. Adam finds his hand and interlaces their fingers together and doubles down, fucking Jim senseless (fucking himself open) and they're together so much Jim's prickly thorns cut at him from under his own skin.

Jim comes first, with a harsh cry; Adam feels his cock twitch—twitch, twitch—inside of him and he throws his head back as Jim's fumbles for him. Senses overloaded, he cannot be sure, but he thinks he had come before Jim put his hand on his dick, just from the feeling of Jim coming in him.

Adam wants to slump down and curl around Jim; he also wants to keep looking him in the eye like maybe you shouldn't do with someone whom you only fucked once. Jim makes the choice for him, though, grabbing him by the neck and dragging him down until he can press a quick kiss onto Adam's temple. "Adam," he whispers into his ear, breathless. Then, "Hi?"

"Hi yourself," Adam replies.

Jim's hands slide down to cup Adam's shoulder blades. He maneuvers them onto their sides, flat on the couch where they barely fit. They make do only because they're so close. Jim's arms stay locked and secure around the span of Adam's back, but his cock slipped out of Adam's ass. There's a trickle of come; Adam thinks about how it must look against the black of his augs and barely holds in a groan. His fingers involuntarily knot and unknot around Jim's waistcoat and, belatedly, he realizes he's spreading lube onto the fine silk. After he came all over it just minutes ago. "I think I've ruined your suit," he says carefully, hands stilling.

Jim snorts. "Can't be worse than the couch." Adam winces and tries to disentangle, although what he could do about the fact now, he's not sure. It's not like he has a portable steam cleaner inside his arm. Jim stops him with a thumb on his chin. "Wait. Admit it, you just hate green."

"I—" Adam loses the fight to not smile. "No. I probably would've chosen a darker shade myself, though."

"Mhm." Jim throws one leg around Adam's hip, brings them back closer together. Adam's oversensitive cock jerks against Jim's creased pants. He's still slightly self-conscious, yet he can't help but press into it. Jim asks, "Is your apartment all black?"

Adam thinks—hopes—he knows what that's really about; his body is way ahead of him, already loosening back into Jim. "Maybe. Wanna see?"

Jim shrugs, fake casual, shoulder jolting under Adam's head like a very deep earthquake. "Sure, why not." 

Perhaps Adam should be worried about how easy their coming together has turned out to be—part of him certainly is—it's not like they _talked_ and resolved anything, but in the end it's only as easy as pulling a trigger. You move your finger and bang! sparks, a hole in another person, in your life. Sometimes they're the exact same shape. 

Jim's lips are kissed bloody red. In a second, Adam will kiss them again. In an hour or two, November will come; they say it's the worst month in Prague, cold and miserable and wet. In two months, a new year, probably worse than this one, but with how their lives are, thinking ahead to it is a pointless exercise. In the meantime, this new precious thing that has already faced off against a ruined suit and couch.

Adam's kind of curious what else it can survive.


End file.
